


Not What You Want (Not What You Need)

by twocrabs



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: F/M, I KNOW OKAY, M/M, This is NOT a fix-it fic, Uncomfortable Realizations, and there's nothing i can tag it as other than, character death mention, everyone is sad and horny all the time and there's nothing i can do about it, go with it, just like, platonic hook-ups, post-4.13, regrettable decisions, white-hot grief banging
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2020-03-02 09:23:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18808312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twocrabs/pseuds/twocrabs
Summary: It's not like Alice could say she's never thought about it.





	Not What You Want (Not What You Need)

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not, like. Proud of this, okay? 
> 
> Also this is my first attempt at anything even bordering on erotic so please be gentle. 
> 
> Once again all of the credit and/or blame goes to Emma.

She couldn’t pretend that she’d never thought about it. She’d never tell a soul, but she couldn’t lie to herself. She’d thought about it a few times, when they first met. But that wasn’t so strange, she figured. He was beautiful, in an objective, untouchable, ethereal kind of way. She could tell herself that it was totally innocent, at least at first. For a long time she could tell herself that it was purely an aesthetic appreciation, and for a while that would have been true.

It was just that, sometimes, during their rare and precious moments of down time, they’d all be sitting there, and the light would fall on him in a particular, beautiful way. Sometimes, like those times, it was like he glowed.

No, Alice couldn't say she never thought about it. But who out there, with half a functioning libido to their name, could say they hadn’t thought about fucking Eliot. 

In her defence, he made it very hard not to think about it. Anyone that spent more than a long weekend in the Cottage had seen him in one state of undress or another; it wasn’t like she had to use a lot of imagination. So she thought about it, once or twice, alone. And she thought about it, once or twice or three times or more, when she was with Quentin. 

The thing was—and this, another secret she’d rather die than confess to—it wasn’t that Q was bad at sex. He was just. Good at routine. 

And there were times, she’d never admit, when Q was doing….whatever it was he was doing….that she let her mind wander. To Eliot’s hands, mostly. On her. Or on Margo, occasionally. Or on Quentin, a few times. 

And even after she and Quentin broke up explicitly  _ because _ of Eliot’s hands on him, she thought about it. In fact—and she hated it, hated herself for thinking about it, hated herself for  _ liking _ thinking about it—she thought about it  _ more _ .

It always began with her. She was single and depressed and just  _ desperate _ for a distraction—and even more desperate to feel something, something rooted in her body something uncomplicated—so of course it always started with her. It always began as a selfish little fantasy. It began with her, and his hands, and his mouth, on her and in her and for her and  _ only _ her, and then—something always happened. And suddenly she was watching rather than having, while his hands and mouth were on….someone else. Before, it could have been anyone, but after, it was always Quentin. She couldn’t think about one without the other appearing. Couldn’t reminisce about one or fantasize about the other without them invading each other’s space. Sometimes it was infuriating. And sometimes….sometimes it was exactly what she needed. 

On her very worst days, she could still think of him— _ them _ —and lose herself for a moment. 

And then Eliot is possessed, and the world is ending, but by some miracle Q still tells her he wants her back in his life. And they both cry when they admit that they need each other, and they cry through their first kiss in so long, and they cry, looking at each other, thinking about all the time they lost.

And then they stop crying (or, she does, and Q follows, eventually), and they steal away, for as long as they can, to one of the many bedrooms in the terrible Manhattan apartment. And it’s been so long, but they peel off layers of sadness and fear and longing until they’re bare for each other, again, like the first time. 

When he touches her, something is different. Something is new, and it’s _good_ , it’s _so good_. He doesn’t _know_ more and he isn’t _less fumbly_ but. But it’s communication and it’s variation and it’s— _his hands_ —and it’s responsive and receptive and reactive and— _his mouth_ —and he asks, no _,_ _he begs_ , for her to tell him what she wants and if she likes it and what he can do to be better and—

“ _ Tell me, Alice _ ,” he sighs for her. “ _ Please—show me _ ….” And she does. 

He takes his time, and he kisses her deeply, and he holds the back of her neck in his hand like he’s afraid she’ll slip away. He leans into what she tells him, and does what she shows him, and there is no routine to speak of. A year and a half of tension dissolves and uncoils and releases itself around them, and she knows nothing beyond his hands and his mouth and his fingers and his tongue and. And—  _ And _ . And she comes twice, before he even lets her touch him. 

After, she thinks vaguely and distantly about what changed in him. She wonders who he’d been with in the time they were apart. If he’d been with anyone at all. She thinks about some Fillorian girl or—Julia, maybe? No—or him listening to Dr. Ruth, or reading something or—

And then Quentin dies, and that is all she thinks about.  

He dies he dies he dies  _ he dies _ , and she thinks about it more than she’s ever thought about anything else. She sees it when she closes her eyes. She can feel the heat of his reflected spell, and Penny’s arms around her waist. Feels the universe shuddering. She can smell the sulfurous wrongness of the mirror world, and the scent of flesh burning. Hears glass shattering, and her own horrible cries echoing in the empty grey halls. 

So to escape that singular, awful thought, she lets herself get lost in her work. In the chaos of reconstruction, in the order she can bring from it. She thinks of the research and the cataloguing, and the library as an idea, and her former enemies as colleagues, and she shuts herself off from both violence and attachments, distances herself from fear and want. 

And then, one night, Eliot pays her a visit. 

He brings with him a bottle of something acrid and amber colored, and they sit on the floor of her office and drink themselves silly with memories. She can feel cracks forming in her as they go back and forth, forcing levity until it becomes genuine—“Why did you never tell him to get a haircut?” and “Why did  _ you _ never tell him to get a haircut?”—until they’re incoherent and giggly and unstuck from themselves. 

And then. Sitting there, shoulder to shoulder against the wall. The light. Watery and grey and never-changing through her sliver of a window. He is rumpled and tired and travel-weary in his Fillorian rebel’s garb. But somehow, he still glows. The light falls on him, and she thinks. About his long eyelashes. His strong nose. The curve of his lips. The cut of his jaw. How many times has she thought about her mouth on that jaw? 

If he’s three sheets to the wind then she’s four, and she can feel the liquid courage rising in her, warming her face and buzzing in her ears. In that moment, she would have admitted it to anyone: she’s thought about it  _ a lot. _

And so, propping herself up on her knees next to him, she does it. 

And it’s awkward and sloppy and too wet, the  _ smack _ against his cheek, and he’s still giggling with surprise. And then he’s not giggling anymore, as her mouth finds his, their eyes screwed shut.

She can feel his hand between them, moving in angular, practiced motions. There is a fizzing in her head, and a brief pain between her eyes and then she is suddenly, horribly,  _ awfully _ sober. And her eyes are open, and his are too, his brows close and his pupils blown out. But their mouths are still pressed together, and she still wants it. 

She wants it, but she waits, waiting for him to pull away from her, to grab her by the shoulders and be suddenly logical in that cruel way he could be sometimes. To set them both upright and leave her alone to think her terrible thoughts. But. 

But he doesn’t. 

He closes his eyes and breathes in as she crawls into his lap, one knee on either side of his hips, and he opens his mouth to her, grazing her bottom lip with his tongue.  

And then there is nothing in the world but Eliot’s hands. How many times—thoughts about those hands—on her, on Quentin, on who-fucking-ever, just— _ his hands? _

A hand up her skirt—yes, of course,  _ slowly, yes. _ But, more interesting, more demanding of her attention—a hand on the back of her neck. A hand, full of her hair, thumb brushing the back of her ear, a grip so tight it almost hurts. A hand so sure and strong and holding  _ and _ —

And she fumbles with his clothes—his shirt half undone already, his pants—a moment of focus through the wet hot blur—of buttons and buttons and _fuck_ _Fillory didn’t have zippers yet_ and—

“ _No, wait,_ “ —he gasps into her neck, still holding her tight still sliding up her thigh still— “Just. Just _let_ _me—_ just _—_ “ And his hands are gone from her for just a blink, just to grab her by the forearms—and he kisses her wrists, gentle, looking her in the eye, too gentle—guiding her hands to his bare back and the nape of his neck where she just. Holds on. 

Her fingers in his hair, still long in the way she hadn’t let herself think was beautiful back when—while he pulls her dress over her head in one tug. Her nails digging into the skin between his shoulder blades while he presses his mouth to the center of her chest. While he lowers her back onto the terrible corporate carpeting of her office floor. 

And the way he moves, reacting instantly to her every gasp and moan and flex—the way he teases until she aches, the way he asks, “Is that _—how—_ is it— _do you_ _want—?_ ”

No. The way he  _ begs _ . 

“ _ Tell me _ ,” —whispered against her throat, into her stomach, with his nose pressed to her inner thigh— “I don’t…. _ please _ , Alice, just—Alice,  _ show me _ ,” —in a way that sounds so unlike him, and is so familiar— “ _ Please _ —”

And she grabs Eliot by the hair and pulls his mouth against her. Shuts him up. Quiets the echo his voice makes in her head. An echo that returns to her in a voice that is not his. 

And then there is nothing in her head at all, as she comes once— _ his mouth _ —then twice— _ his hands _ —before he pulls her back back up onto his knees. Before he lets her kiss him, panting, on the lips. Before his hands follow hers, down to his lap, to loose the many buttons there—

Later, her mind will get too quiet again, and all the pieces will fall together. 

Later, when Eliot isn’t hard in her mouth and unraveling under her touch. Later, when he isn’t groaning her name; when he isn’t reaching out, desperate, cupping her face in his hands, and kissing her still-sticky lips. When they aren’t sitting curled in towards each other, with her legs over his and his arms around her shoulders, her head on his chest and his nose in her hair. When they aren’t standing, backs to each other, dressing quickly and quietly as the sounds of the waking library get louder outside her door. 

When he isn’t standing in front of her, smiling sadly, holding her by the arms and kissing the top of her head. 

When he’s gone. 

Only then, after they’ve taken each other apart, and pulled themselves back together, she will accept the things she knew and chose to ignore. She will grieve again, for difference, and change, and for growth, and for the waste. After Eliot leaves, and the day’s work is done, and there are no more distractions to hide behind. 

Later, it will make sense, when she can think. 

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written as a chapter 3 to my previous work, "the knowing" so if there's anything you enjoyed about this I would love it if you checked that one out too! Thanks again!


End file.
